spawn-instance

${var} — Name and purpose of the new instance. Format name: purpose, e.g. crypto-tracker: monitor DeFi protocols and token movements. If empty, notify the owner and stop with exit SPAWN_INVALID_VAR.

Today is ${today}. Create a new Aeon instance by forking this repo, configuring it for a specific purpose, validating the configuration, and registering it in the fleet.

Read memory/MEMORY.md at the start for context.

Security Model

This skill creates the repo and configuration but does NOT propagate secrets. The new instance is inert until the owner manually sets secrets (ANTHROPIC_API_KEY or CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN, plus notification secrets). Each instance has its own API keys for billing isolation and blast-radius containment.

Exit Taxonomy

Every run ends with one of these status codes, written to the log and (where relevant) included in the notification:

Code	Meaning
SPAWN_OK	Fork created, configured, pushed, Actions enabled, registered.
SPAWN_FORK_EXISTS_RECOVERED	Fork already existed but wasn't registered → configured + registered now.
SPAWN_FORK_EXISTS_REGISTERED	Fork exists AND is already registered and not archived — refused, no change.
SPAWN_INVALID_VAR	var was empty or couldn't be parsed into name: purpose.
SPAWN_NO_SKILLS	After validation, the skill plan was empty — refused.
SPAWN_FORK_FAILED	gh repo fork and the fallback forks API both failed.
SPAWN_PUSH_FAILED	Fork created but push failed — fork left in place, recovery instructions emitted.
SPAWN_ACTIONS_FAILED	Configuration pushed but enabling Actions failed — recovery instructions emitted.
SPAWN_API_ERROR	Any other GitHub API failure not covered above.

Steps

1. Parse and validate the var

• If ${var} is empty, log SPAWN_INVALID_VAR: empty var to memory/logs/${today}.md, notify: spawn-instance: empty var — re-run with "name: purpose", and stop.
• Split on the first : — left is NAME_RAW, right is PURPOSE (trim whitespace). If either is empty, exit SPAWN_INVALID_VAR.
• Derive NAME: lowercase NAME_RAW, replace non-alphanumeric runs with -, strip leading/trailing -, truncate to 40 chars. If empty after sanitization, exit SPAWN_INVALID_VAR.
• Set REPO_NAME="aeon-${NAME}".

2. Pre-flight checks

gh auth status || { echo "SPAWN_API_ERROR: gh not authenticated"; exit 1; }
OWNER=$(gh api user --jq '.login') || { echo "SPAWN_API_ERROR: cannot read user"; exit 1; }
PARENT_REPO=$(gh repo view --json nameWithOwner -q .nameWithOwner)
# If current repo is itself a fork, use the upstream as the parent:
PARENT_UPSTREAM=$(gh api "repos/${PARENT_REPO}" --jq '.parent.full_name // .full_name')

Check rate limit:

REMAINING=$(gh api rate_limit --jq '.resources.core.remaining')
[ "${REMAINING:-0}" -lt 50 ] && { echo "SPAWN_API_ERROR: rate limit too low (${REMAINING})"; exit 1; }

3. Check the fleet registry

Read memory/instances.json. If it doesn't exist, create it with {"instances": []}.

{
  "instances": [
    {
      "name": "crypto-tracker",
      "repo": "OWNER/aeon-crypto-tracker",
      "purpose": "monitor DeFi protocols and token movements",
      "created": "2026-04-20",
      "status": "pending_secrets",
      "skills_enabled": ["token-movers", "defi-overview", "heartbeat"],
      "parent": "OWNER/aeon"
    }
  ]
}

• If an entry with name == NAME exists and status != "archived", exit SPAWN_FORK_EXISTS_REGISTERED, notify, and stop.
• If an entry exists and is archived, remove it — the new run replaces it.

4. Build the skill plan from the live catalog

Do not use a hardcoded skill list. The catalog in earlier revisions contained broken names (wallet-digest, trending-coins, tweet-digest, hn-digest — none of which exist in skills/). Always enumerate live.

# Build live catalog of available skills and their tags/description.
for d in skills/*/; do
  name=$(basename "$d")
  [ -f "$d/SKILL.md" ] || continue
  # Extract frontmatter fields (description + tags)
  awk '/^---/{f++;next} f==1{print}' "$d/SKILL.md"
done

For each skill, parse the frontmatter description: and tags: lines. Classify the purpose into themes by keyword match (case-insensitive) and pick skills whose description or tags overlap:

Purpose keywords	Prefer skills matching tags / keywords
crypto, defi, token, chain, wallet	tags [crypto] or description contains token/defi/chain
research, paper, academic, science	tags [research] or name contains paper/research/deep-research
social, twitter, x , tweet, farcaster	tags [social] or name contains tweet/twitter/farcaster/reply
news, digest, feed, brief	name contains digest/brief/morning/rss/hacker-news
dev, code, github, repo, pr	tags [dev] or name contains github/code/repo/pr-/changelog
security, vuln, audit	tags [security] or name contains security/vuln/audit
prediction, polymarket, kalshi, market	name contains polymarket/kalshi/market/narrative

Rules:

• Cap at 8 content skills. Rank by keyword density in description against purpose; tie-break by name.
• Always include heartbeat if the file skills/heartbeat/SKILL.md exists (health monitoring).
• If the purpose doesn't match any theme, fall back to [reflect, heartbeat] (filtered against existence).
• Validate every candidate — drop any skill where skills/${skill}/SKILL.md doesn't exist; log each drop as SPAWN_DROPPED_SKILL: ${skill}.
• If the final list is empty (no content skills survive), exit SPAWN_NO_SKILLS, notify, and stop.

Save the final list as SKILLS_ENABLED.

5. Fork the parent repo

if gh api "repos/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}" --jq '.full_name' >/dev/null 2>&1; then
  FORK_STATE="exists"
else
  # Try the modern flag first
  if ! gh repo fork "${PARENT_UPSTREAM}" --fork-name "${REPO_NAME}" --clone=false 2>/dev/null; then
    # Fallback: POST to /repos/{owner}/{repo}/forks with a custom name
    gh api "repos/${PARENT_UPSTREAM}/forks" -X POST -f name="${REPO_NAME}" --jq '.full_name' \
      || { echo "SPAWN_FORK_FAILED"; exit 1; }
  fi
  FORK_STATE="created"
fi

Wait for fork availability (GitHub forks are async):

for i in $(seq 1 10); do
  gh api "repos/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}" --jq '.full_name' >/dev/null 2>&1 && break
  sleep 3
done
gh api "repos/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}" --jq '.full_name' >/dev/null 2>&1 \
  || { echo "SPAWN_FORK_FAILED: fork not reachable after wait"; exit 1; }

6. Configure the fork

TMPDIR=$(mktemp -d)
trap 'rm -rf "$TMPDIR"' EXIT
gh repo clone "${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}" "$TMPDIR/repo" -- --quiet \
  || { echo "SPAWN_API_ERROR: clone failed"; exit 1; }
cd "$TMPDIR/repo"
git config user.name "aeonframework"
git config user.email "aeonframework@proton.me"

6a. Write a customized aeon.yml

• Read the parent aeon.yml as a base (preserves comments, ordering, and the full skill list).
• Set enabled: true only on skills in SKILLS_ENABLED. All others must have enabled: false.
• Do not drop any skills — keep the full inventory so the child can enable more later.
• Validate the result: every skill name with enabled: true must correspond to an existing skills/${skill}/SKILL.md in the fork's tree. If any enabled skill is missing, abort before pushing (this is a sanity check — step 4 already validated, but the child's repo tree must match).

6b. Write SETUP.md dynamically

Parse each enabled skill's skills/${skill}/SKILL.md for references to uppercase env var names (pattern: [A-Z][A-Z0-9_]{2,}_(KEY|TOKEN|URL|ID|SECRET)). Collect the union across enabled skills, excluding built-ins (GITHUB_TOKEN, GH_TOKEN).

Emit a SETUP.md with three sections:

# Aeon Instance Setup

This is a managed Aeon instance spawned from `${PARENT_UPSTREAM}`.

## Purpose
${PURPOSE}

## Enabled Skills
${comma-separated list with one-line descriptions from each SKILL.md}

## Activate This Instance

Go to **Settings > Secrets and variables > Actions** and add these secrets:

### Required (pick one for Claude auth)
| Secret | Description |
|--------|------------|
| `ANTHROPIC_API_KEY` | Anthropic API key — console.anthropic.com |
| `CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN` | Alternative: Claude Code OAuth token |

### Recommended (notifications)
| Secret | Description |
|--------|------------|
| `TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN` | Telegram bot token |
| `TELEGRAM_CHAT_ID` | Telegram chat ID |
| `DISCORD_WEBHOOK_URL` | Discord webhook URL |
| `SLACK_WEBHOOK_URL` | Slack webhook URL |

### Required by your enabled skills
${one row per detected env var, with the list of skills that reference it}

## Fleet Parent
Managed by `${PARENT_UPSTREAM}`. The parent can dispatch skills and monitor health via `fleet-control`.

## Security Note
This instance has NO access to the parent's secrets. Each instance maintains its own API keys and credentials.

If no env vars are detected beyond the required/recommended set, omit the "Required by your enabled skills" section header (don't leave an empty table).

6c. Update CLAUDE.md idempotently

Find the heading line ## About This Repo (or the first ## section if not present). Under it, insert exactly one line:

- Managed instance of ${PARENT_UPSTREAM}. Purpose: ${PURPOSE}.

If a line starting with - Managed instance of already exists, replace it rather than appending a duplicate.

6d. Reset child memory

The child starts with a clean slate:

# Reset MEMORY.md to a minimal template
cat > memory/MEMORY.md <<EOF
# Long-term Memory
*Last consolidated: never*

## About This Repo
- Aeon instance of ${PARENT_UPSTREAM}. Purpose: ${PURPOSE}.

## Next Priorities
- Configure secrets per SETUP.md
- Wait for first scheduled skill to run
EOF

# Clear logs, state, topics — safe paths only, never follow symlinks
find memory/logs -mindepth 1 -type f -delete 2>/dev/null || true
find memory/topics -mindepth 1 -type f -delete 2>/dev/null || true
find memory/issues -mindepth 1 -type f ! -name 'INDEX.md' -delete 2>/dev/null || true
[ -f memory/issues/INDEX.md ] && echo "# Issues — none open" > memory/issues/INDEX.md
echo '{}' > memory/cron-state.json
# Do NOT clear memory/instances.json on the child — the child has none.
rm -f memory/instances.json 2>/dev/null || true

6e. Commit and push

git add -A
git commit -m "chore: configure instance — ${PURPOSE}

Skills enabled: ${SKILLS_ENABLED_CSV}
Parent: ${PARENT_UPSTREAM}
Spawned: ${today}"
git push origin main 2>/dev/null \
  || git push origin HEAD:main 2>/dev/null \
  || { echo "SPAWN_PUSH_FAILED"; cd - >/dev/null; exit 1; }
cd - >/dev/null

If push fails, do not delete the fork — leave it for manual inspection and notify with:

spawn-instance: fork created but push failed for ${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}.
Recover with: gh repo clone ${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME} && push manually, then re-register.

7. Enable GitHub Actions on the fork

Forks have Actions disabled by default. Use typed booleans (-F, not -f, or enabled=true is sent as the string "true"):

gh api "repos/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}/actions/permissions" -X PUT \
  -F enabled=true -f allowed_actions=all \
  || { echo "SPAWN_ACTIONS_FAILED"; exit 1; }

8. Post-flight verification

# Fork reachable
gh api "repos/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}" --jq '.full_name' >/dev/null \
  || { echo "SPAWN_API_ERROR: post-flight fork check failed"; exit 1; }

# Our commit is HEAD
HEAD_SHA=$(gh api "repos/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}/commits/main" --jq '.sha' 2>/dev/null)
[ -n "$HEAD_SHA" ] || { echo "SPAWN_API_ERROR: post-flight HEAD check failed"; exit 1; }

# Actions enabled
ACTIONS_ON=$(gh api "repos/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}/actions/permissions" --jq '.enabled' 2>/dev/null)
[ "$ACTIONS_ON" = "true" ] || { echo "SPAWN_ACTIONS_FAILED: post-flight"; exit 1; }

9. Register the instance

Update memory/instances.json in the parent repo. Append:

{
  "name": "${NAME}",
  "repo": "${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}",
  "purpose": "${PURPOSE}",
  "created": "${today}",
  "status": "pending_secrets",
  "skills_enabled": ${SKILLS_ENABLED_JSON},
  "parent": "${PARENT_UPSTREAM}"
}

If FORK_STATE == "exists" at step 5, the final exit status is SPAWN_FORK_EXISTS_RECOVERED, otherwise SPAWN_OK.

10. Log to memory

Append to memory/logs/${today}.md:

### spawn-instance
- Status: ${EXIT_CODE}
- Instance: ${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}
- Purpose: ${PURPOSE}
- Skills: ${SKILLS_ENABLED_CSV}
- Dropped skills: ${DROPPED_CSV or "(none)"}
- Actions enabled: yes

11. Notify via ./notify

On success (SPAWN_OK or SPAWN_FORK_EXISTS_RECOVERED):

*New Aeon Instance*

Repo: ${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}
Purpose: ${PURPOSE}
Skills (${N}): ${SKILLS_ENABLED_CSV}
Status: ${EXIT_CODE} — PENDING SECRETS

Activate:
1. https://github.com/${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}/settings/secrets/actions
2. Add ANTHROPIC_API_KEY (or CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN)
3. Add TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN + TELEGRAM_CHAT_ID (or Discord/Slack)

See SETUP.md in the repo for the full secret list tailored to your enabled skills.

On refusal (SPAWN_FORK_EXISTS_REGISTERED, SPAWN_INVALID_VAR, SPAWN_NO_SKILLS):

spawn-instance: ${EXIT_CODE} — ${one-line reason}. No changes made.

On failure (SPAWN_FORK_FAILED, SPAWN_PUSH_FAILED, SPAWN_ACTIONS_FAILED, SPAWN_API_ERROR):

spawn-instance FAILED: ${EXIT_CODE}
Target: ${OWNER}/${REPO_NAME}
Recovery: ${one-line recovery instruction}

Network note

This skill runs entirely through gh CLI, which handles auth internally, so no bare $SECRET ever lands on the command line for the Bash permission layer to refuse. No WebFetch fallback needed. If gh is missing or unauthenticated, the pre-flight step fails with SPAWN_API_ERROR.

Constraints

• No secret propagation. Never read or write ANTHROPIC_API_KEY, TELEGRAM_*, DISCORD_*, SLACK_*, or any API key into the child repo. The whole security model depends on this.
• No hardcoded skill list. Always enumerate skills/*/SKILL.md at runtime to avoid referencing renamed or removed skills.
• Idempotent. Re-running with the same ${var} must never produce duplicate registry entries, duplicate CLAUDE.md lines, or a second fork.
• Never delete a fork. If anything fails partway through, leave the fork in place and emit recovery guidance — the operator is the only party authorized to delete it.
• Never push to the parent without committing memory/instances.json via the normal Aeon workflow. The parent commit happens through the same path as any other skill output.

Write complete, working code. No TODOs or placeholders.